Semiconductor devices are used in a variety of electronic applications, such as personal computers, cell phones, digital cameras, and other electronic equipment. The semiconductor industry continues to improve the integration density of various electronic components (e.g., transistors, diodes, resistors, capacitors, etc.) by continual reductions in minimum feature size, which allow more components to be integrated into a given area. As the demand for miniaturization, higher speed and greater bandwidth, as well as lower power consumption and latency has grown recently, there has grown a need for smaller and more creative packaging techniques for semiconductor dies.
As semiconductor technologies further advance, stacked semiconductor devices, e.g., three-dimensional integrated circuits (3DICs), have emerged as an effective alternative to further reduce the physical size of a semiconductor device. In a stacked semiconductor device, active circuits such as logic, memory, processor circuits and the like are fabricated on different semiconductor wafers. Two or more semiconductor wafers may be installed or stacked on top of one another to further reduce the form factor of the semiconductor device.
Two semiconductor wafers and/or dies may be bonded together through suitable bonding techniques. The commonly used bonding techniques include direct bonding, chemically activated bonding, plasma activated bonding, anodic bonding, eutectic bonding, glass frit bonding, adhesive bonding, thermo-compressive bonding, reactive bonding and/or the like. An electrical connection may be provided between the stacked semiconductor wafers. The stacked semiconductor devices may provide a higher density with smaller form factors and allow for increased performance and lower power consumption.